[nabs-l] Device Helps Blind See with Tongue

[Brandon Keith Biggs]

haha!
I really think that using the tongue to do things is a huge under exploited 
part of our body... I'd like to see some way to control my note taker with 
my tongue...
I doubt I'll be buying this, unless it makes sight-reading piano music 
feasible.
As for sighted people not understanding that blind people are probably 
better equipped to travel than they are, it probably has to do with the fact 
sighted people have no idea how to travel without signs.
I'm highly amused and I hope the failure of their first product doesn't 
deter them from making Bluetooth remote controls for the mouth!
Thanks,

Brandon Keith Biggs
-----Original Message----- 
From: Justin Salisbury
Sent: Tuesday, May 22, 2012 3:13 PM
To: nabs-l at nfbnet.org
Subject: [nabs-l] Device Helps Blind See with Tongue

Philosophy Discussion Time

I just caught this story on the local news, and I want to hear people's 
opinions of it.  There are many different versions of this news story, but 
here's a link to a page with a video and text article:

http://wearecentralpa.com/fulltext-healthcast?nxd_id=369932

Feel free to find other versions of this story using a simple search engine.

When I heard that Mark couldn't wait for the day that he could navigate his 
own home independently with a device, I thought to myself "hey, I already 
have one of those devices.  It's called a cane!"

In my reading on the story, I get the impression that researchers think that 
this device is important because we blind people are oblivious to our 
surroundings and need some way to get information about them.  I think this 
is cool research for the sake of research, but I see absolutely no practical 
need for the device.  With the proper skills and training, we can 
independently navigate our own surroundings.  I further wonder if maybe 
these uneducated or incorrectly educated researchers simply don't know about 
the techniques we blind people can use to independently navigate our 
surroundings or if they view them as inferior and think we should be trying 
to operate as closely to sighted people as we can.

What does everyone on the list think?

Justin Salisbury
President
North Carolina Association of Blind Students


Justin M. Salisbury
Class of 2012
B.A. in Mathematics
East Carolina University
president at alumni.ecu.edu

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change 
the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”    —MARGARET MEAD

_______________________________________________
nabs-l mailing list
nabs-l at nfbnet.org
http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nabs-l_nfbnet.org
To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for 
nabs-l:
http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nabs-l_nfbnet.org/brandonboy13%40comcast.net